Yesterday afternoon at 5pm the train ride to Kiev started quite horribly, it was about 35 C in the train (outside 28-30 maybe), and because its a border crossing train which goes hundreds of kilometres in Russian territory before the passport checking at the first station, opening the windows was strictly forbidden (penalty: 50 000 rubles, we asked to now if its worth ...  its not).

Later the temperature fell due to the outdated wooden "isolation" of the window, and interesting conversations started in the train (there is no relation probably). In my section there was a 50 year old war veteran who was going home from a veteran meeting in Kiev. No, he did not talk anything about afganistan or serbia, but about his own small lake south from moscow what he bought after retiring to do fishing there. I tought him to play italian cards but with mixed success due to langage barrier.

The other interesting conversation was with a cabin crew member. She was happy to: a) find somebody with who she can talk in English what she studies (its not easy in Russia) b) finding a "relative", because she is from the Udmurt Republic (she is udmurt), and udmurts are (according to her) finno-ugorics. So she is very close relative of mine ...

After arrival the former soldier helped me to buy ticket to Kazan at Kievskaja station. And here do the problems start: he had a long conversation with the lady at the ticket office, and finally bought a ticket for tonight (not tomorrow night, as we aggreed). He said all other trains are full for the next 3 days. To be honest i did not believe him. But by now i checked on the internet, and really. Just Kupe and Lux tickets are available (they are 3x-4x price), no Platskart. So he was right. So i have to leave moscow today at midnight, i arrive to kazan at 13h tomorrow, on platskart. Also,  checked and the Kazan - Yekaterinburg train is also full, but with Katja, my host here in Moscow (for 0 days now ...) has found a possibility for me: on sunday (very) early morning i can get to Izhevsk (which is the capital of the Udmurt Replublic by the way, but that doesn't matter now) by elektrichka, then spend the day there,  and take a train in the evening to arrive to Yekaterinburg at 5am. So that's the plan now. Tonight before departing to Kazan i will buy this Izhevsk-Yekaterinburg ticket, according to the internet there are still hundreds of places left (our "relatives" don't travel ... too bad :) ).

During the day we went to Kolomenskoje park, wich is on the side of the river Moscow and with many nice - tsar age - buildings. Now in the evening we plan to go cycling somewhere in the otskirts of moscow, and then i go to Kazansky vakzal.